• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.39-51
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• 2021

Based on spontaneous speech data collected in 2020, this study examined the production and perception of Korean lenis, aspirated, and fortis stops. Unlike the controlled experiments of previous studies, lenis and aspirated stops of males in their 30s were not distinguished by voice onset time (VOT) in spontaneous speech. Perceptual experiments were conducted on young females, the leaders of language change. F0 was found to serve as the primary cue for the perception of lenis stops, and then VOT distinguished the aspirated and fortis stops. The fact that the sounds were always perceived as lenis stops when F0 was low, irrespective of whether VOT was short or long, showed that F0 plays an absolute role in the perception of lenis stops. However, in some cases the aspirated and lenis stops were distinguished only by VOT, which does not happen in production. In terms of sound change, disagreement between production and perception systems occurs when sound change is in progress. In particular, when production change precedes perception change, it indicates that the sound change is in its latter stages. Young females still maintain the previous system in perception because the distinction of lenis and aspirated stops by VOT was valid in their parents' generation. In other words, VOT is still used for perception to communicate with other groups.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.201-209
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• 2005

This study was investigated developmental temporal features in Putonghua-speaking children. The total of 212 children between the ages 2;6 and 6;5 participated in Shanghai. Speech materials were constructed according to aspiration feature in stop sounds of Putonghua. Six words were selected in this study. A voice onset time was measured. Non-parametric procedures were employed for all the analyses. The VOT value across bilabial, alveolar, and velar stops was significantly differed between aspirated and unaspirated stops for each age group. Effect of age is. significant for unaspirated stops. It is clear that each of Putonghua stops showed decreasing mean and standard deviation. The overshoot phenomenon of VOT was apparent from the age of 2;6-2;11 to 4;6-4;11. There was high variability in the production of lag time for aspirated stops.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.25-39
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• 2007

The present study investigated some perceptual phonetic attributes of two Korean stop types, aspirated and lax, in medial position of an accentual phrase. The intonational pattern across syllables (Jun, 1993) is argued to depend on the type of stop (aspirated vs. lax) only in the initial position of an accentual phrase. In Kang & Dilley (2007), we showed that significant differences between aspirated and lax stops in medial position of an accentual phrase exist in closure duration, voice-onset time, and fundamental frequency (F0) values for post-stop vowels. In the present perception experiment, we investigated whether these phonetic attributes contribute to the perception of these two types of stops: The closure durations and/or F0's of post-stop vowels on accentual-phrase medial words were altered and twenty native Korean speakers then judged these words as beginning with an aspirated or lax stop. Both closure duration and F0 significantly affected judgments of stop identity. These results indicate that a wider range of acoustic cues that distinguish aspirated and lax Korean stops in production also plays a role in perception. To account for these results we suggest some phonetic and phonological models of consonant-tone interactions for Korean.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.39-44
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• 2018

This study aimed to examine whether preconsonantal vowel shortening, which occurs in many languages, exists in Chinese. To this end, we compared 15 pairs of Chinese bi-syllabic words with intervocalic unaspirated/aspirated stops. The results revealed that (1) the effect of the feature aspiration of the following stop on the preceding vowel (V1) was neither significant nor consistent though V1 tends to be a little longer before an unaspirated stop; (2) the following unaspirated stop closure (C) was similar to or longer than its aspirated cognate; (3) the durational sum of V1 and C was longer when the stop is unaspirated, and V1 and C had no compensatory relationship; (4) Voice Onset Time (VOT) was significantly longer when the stop is aspirated than unaspirated; (5) the vowel (V2) following VOT was significantly longer when the stop is unaspirated, so the differentials in VOT were partially compensated; (6) despite the partial compensation, the sum of VOT and V2 was longer when the stop is aspirated; (7) words with an intervocalic aspirated stop were longer than those with its unaspirated cognate. It is concluded that while VOT is the most important factor for deciding the timing structure of Chinese words with intervocalic stops, closure duration is crucial for Korean and many other languages.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.17-26
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• 2002

Voice onset time (VOT) is defined as the time interval from the oral release of a stop consonant to the onset of glottal pulsing in the following vowel. VOT is a temporal characteristic of stop consonants that reflects the complex timing of glottal articulation relative to supraglottal articulation. There have been many reports on efforts to clarify the acoustical and physiological properties that differentiate the three types of Korean stops, including acoustic, fiberscopic, aerodynamic and electromyographic studies. In the acoustic and fiberscopic studies for stop consonants, the voice onset time and glottal width during the production of stops has been known as the longest and largest in the heavily aspirated type followed by the slightly aspirated type and unaspirated types. The thyroarytenoid and posterior cricoarytenoid muscles were physiologically inter-correlated for differentiating these types of stops. However, a review of the English literature shows that the fine movement of the mucosal edges of the vocal folds during the production of stops has not been well documented. In recent. years, a new method for high-speed recording of laryngeal dynamics by use of a digital recording system allows us to observe with fine time resolution. The movements of the vocal fold edges were documented during the period of stop production using a fiberscopic system of high speed digital images. By observing the glottal width and the visual vibratory movements of the vocal folds before voice onset, the heavily aspirated stop was characterized as being more prominent and dynamic than the slightly aspirated and unaspirated stops.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.25-32
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• 2017

Besides their effect on the f0 contour of the following vowel, Korean stops are undergoing a sound change in which a partial or complete consonantal merger on voice onset time (VOT) is taking place between aspirated and lax stops. Many previous studies on sound change have mainly focused on group-normative effects, that is, effects that are representative of the population as a whole. Few systematic quantitative studies of change in adult individuals have been carried out. The current study examines whether the sound change holds for individual speakers. It focuses on inter-speaker and intra-speaker variability on sound change in contemporary Korean. Speech data were collected for thirteen Seoul Korean speakers studying abroad in America. In order to minimize the possible effects of speech production, socio-phonetic factors such as age, gender, dialect, speech rate, and L2 exposure period were controlled when recruiting participants. The results showed that, for nine out of thirteen speakers, the consonantal merger is taking place between the aspirated and lax stop in terms of VOT. There were also intra-speaker variations on the merger in three aspects: First, is the consonantal (VOT) merger between the two stops is in progress or not? Second, are VOTs for aspirated stops getting shorter or not (i.e., the aspirated-shortening process)? Third, are VOTs for lax stops getting longer or not (i.e., the lax-lengthening process)? The results of remarkable inter-speaker and intra-speaker variability indicate a synchronous speech sound change of the stop system in contemporary Korean. Some speakers are early adopters or active propagators of sound change whereas others are not. Further study is necessary to see whether the inter-speaker differences exceed intra-speaker differences in sound change.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.25-31
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• 2024

This study examines the perceptual motivation behind dissimilation. Consistent with previous arguments suggesting that dissimilation originates from perception rather than production (Coetzee, 2005; Kiparsky, 2003; Scheer, 2013), we hypothesized that an oral stop with short of voice onset time (VOT) would be recognized as non-aspirated more often when it is followed by an aspirated stop with a long VOT. This hypothesis was tested through a perception experiment in which 32 Korean listeners made judgments on the first consonant of C₁VC₂V words manipulated with C₁ VOT and C₂ types. The results revealed that aspirated-based C₁ was recognized as aspirated or tense depending on the duration of VOT, while lenis-based C₁ was consistently recognized as lenis. The dissimilatory effect of aspirated C₂ was confirmed as anticipated, and furthermore, tense C₂ increased the ratio of tense responses more than aspirated C₂. These results provide evidence of a perceptual bias against recurrent aspirated stops, which may play a role in activating a dissimilatory rule or constraint in a language. The assimilatory effect of tense C₂ is in consistent with findings indicating that word-initial tensification is facilitated by the following tense stop in Korean (Kang & Oh, 2016; H. Kim, 2016).

• Speech Sciences
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• v.6
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• pp.103-117
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• 1999

This paper suggests that the onset-coda asymmetry found in languages like Korean and others should be dealt with in terms of one acoustic feature rather than other articulatory features, claiming that the acoustic feature involved here is [noise], i.e., 'aperiodic waveform energy'. It determines the structural well-formedness of the languages in question whether a coda ends in [noise] or not, regardless of the intensity, the frequency, and the time duration of the [noise]. Fricatives, affricates, aspirated stops, tense stops, and released stops are all disallowed in the coda position due to the acoustic feature [noise] they, commonly end with if they were, posited in the coda. The proposal implies that the three seemingly separate prohibitions of consonants in the coda position -- i) no fricatives/affricates, ii) no aspirated/tense stops, and iii) no released stops -- are directly correlated with each other. Incorporation of the one acoustic feature [noise] in the feature theory enables us to see that the aspects of onset-coda asymmetry are derived from one single source: ban, of [noise] in the coda.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.18-26
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• 1997

There are two types of phonetic study, acoustic and physiologic, for differentiating the three manner categories of Korean stop consonants. On the physiologic studies, there are endoscopic, electromyographic(EMG), electroglottographic(EGG) and aerodynamic studies. In this study, I tried to investigate general features of Korean stops using EGG study for the open quotient of vocal fold and baseline shift during speech, and aerodynamic characteristics for e subglottal air pressure, air flow and glottal resistance at consonants. On the aerodynamic study, the glottalized and aspirated stops may be characterized by e increasing subglottal pressure comparing with lenis stop at consonants. The airflow is largest in the aspirated stops followed by lenis stops and glottalized. The glottal airway resistance (GAR) showed highest in the glottalized followed by the lenis, but lowest in e aspirated during e production of consonants, and showed highest in e aspirated, but low in the glottalized and lenis during the production of vowel. The glottal resistance at consonant showed significant difference among consonants and significant interaction between subject and types of consonant. The glottal resistance at vowel showed significant difference among consonants, and e interaction occured between subject and types of consonant. The electroglottography(EGG) has been used for investigating e functioning of e vocal folds during its vibration. The EGG should be related to the patterns of the vocal fold vibration during phonation in characterizing the temporal patterns of each vibratory cycle. The purpose of this study is to investigate the dynamic change of EGG waveforms during continuous speech. The dynamic changes of EGG waveforms fir the three-way distinction of Korean stops were characterized that the aspirated stop appears to be characterized by largest open quotient and smallest glottal contact area of the vocal folds in e initial portion of vocal fold vibration ; the lenis stop by moderate open quotient and glottal contact area ; but the glottalized stop by smallest open quotient and largest glottal contact area. There may be close relationship between the OQ(open quotient) in the initial voice onset and the glottal width at the time of consonant production, the larger glottal width just before vocal fold vibration results in the smaller OQ of the vocal fold vibration in the initial voice onset. The EGG changes of baseline shift during continuous speech production were characterized by the different patterns for the three types of Korean consonants. The small and less stiffness change of baseline shift was found for the lenis and the glottalized, and the largest and stiffest change was found for the aspirated. On the baseline shift for the initial voice onset, they showed so similar patterns with for the consonant production, larger changed in the aspirated. for the lenis and the glottalized during the initial voice onset, three subjects showed individual difference each other. I suggest at s characteristics were strongly related with articulatory activity of vocal tract for the production of consonant, especially for the aspirated stop. The suspecting factors to affect EGG waveforms are glottal width, vertical laryngeal movement and the intrapharyngeal pressure to neighboring tissue during connected spech. So the EGG may be an useful method to describe laryngeal activity to classify pulsing conditions of the larynx during speech production, and EGG research can be controls for monitoring the vocal tract articulation, although above factors to affect EGG would have played such a potentially role on vocal fold vibratory behavior obtained using consonant production.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.3-10
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• 2011

This study examined the production of aspirated stop consonants in Korean and English words to address how the influences differed particularly in terms of proficiency in L2 English. Voice onset times (VOTs) were measured from two American monolinguals and seven Korean speakers. The results showed that VOT patterns for both L1 and L2 stops differed according to their proficiency in L2 English. In L2 English, high proficient speakers produced VOTs that were similar to those of native speakers of English whereas low proficient speakers produced VOTs that were significantly longer than those of proficient speakers. In L1 Korean and L2 English, most of the proficient speakers produced VOTs similarly. Unlike previous findings, Korean VOTs were even shorter than English counterparts. The VOT shortening of aspirated stops in Korean was found for most of the proficient speakers. The findings of the present study suggest that cross language phonetic influences as well as the ongoing VOT shortening in Korean aspirated stops may be correlated with L2 proficiency. Since this is a pilot study with a small number of subjects for each proficiency group, further quantitative study is necessary to generalize.